<P><B>Mark Morris Dance Group - Mixed Bill</B><P>One of the hottest tickets of Dance Umbrella - Morris is one of the finest choreographers working today and his recent work for his own Company and San Francisco Ballet shows that he is firing on all cylinders at the moment. This programme features four works ranging chronologically from a world premier back to a work from 1993. <P>Here are the calendar details from the <A HREF="http://www.danceumbrella.co.uk/menu.htm" TARGET=_blank><B>Dance Umbrella website</B></A>. Click on the coloured dates for programme information and on the venue name for theatre details. <P>Here is our most recent thread on <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum5/HTML/000480.html" TARGET=_blank><B>The Mark Morris Dance Group</B></A> with a host of reviews and comments from 2001.<P>Here is the <A HREF="http://www.mmdg.org/" TARGET=_blank><B>Company website</B></A><P><p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited September 28, 2001).]

Mark Morris, will be revisting Sadlers Wells with his Dance Group next week as part of the Dance Umbrella season, and will join us online to talk about his work and take questions @ <A HREF="http://www.londondance.com" TARGET=_blank>www.londondance.com</A> on Thursday 11 October @4pm. <P>Questions can be submitted in advance at <A HREF="http://www.londondance.com/Form.asp?FormID=41" TARGET=_blank>http://www.londondance.com/Form.asp?FormID=41</A> <P>or simply log in on the day, to ask a question, or just watch the discussion unfold: <A HREF="http://www.londondance.com/chat.htm" TARGET=_blank>http://www.londondance.com/chat.htm</A> <P>Find out more about Mark and his Group @ <A HREF="http://www.londondance.com/admin/PreviewContent.asp?level=3&LevelID=318" TARGET=_blank>http://www.londondance.com/admin/PreviewContent.asp?level=3&LevelID=318</A>

Our <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum5/HTML/000480.html" TARGET=_blank><B>Mark Morris in 2001</B></A> thread now has reviews of the preview performances of 'V', which will be formally premiered at Sadler's Wells. The Bay area critics give the new work a strong recommendation.

<B>Morris dancing</B><BR>by Christopher Bowen in Scotland on Sunday <P><BR>Mark Morris thinks there is no place like home. Unlike Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz however, the celebrated American choreographer won’t be thinking of Kansas should he ever choose to click his heels together. New York, arguably the dance capital of the world, is the place he and his company call home. But unlike most of the modern ensembles who make their base in the city, shuttling between rented studios, the Mark Morris Dance Group actually has a home. <P> <A HREF="http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/searchresults.cfm?id=SS01039959&keyword=ballet" TARGET=_blank>http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/searchresults.cfm?id=SS01039959&keyword=ballet</A>

<B>MARK MORRIS: MILESTONE ENTERPRISE</B><BR>An interview for Dance Umbrella earlier in the year<P>WHO: MARK MORRIS DANCE GROUP<BR>WHEN: TUE 16 - SAT 20 OCTOBER<BR>WHERE: SADLER'S WELLS<BR>TICKETS: 020 7863 8000<P><BR>Mark Morris is still reeling after a three-week season at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, held last November, that honoured the 20th anniversary of his eponymous Dance Group. He speaks of it with a typically pointed retrospective dramatic flair. "It was exhausting. Spectacular. It went great. There were thousands of spectators. It almost killed us. We had two days off, then we were on tour again.You rest when you can."<P>In Morris' case, there is no rest for the natural-born genius. His response, when I tell him that's what he was called in one British newspaper, is "Who said that? Me?!" Morris is joking, but he's serious to the extent that he reads everything written about him. No slight intended, but he has a very healthy ego. Risking understatement, he knows he's good and that he makes good work. That's his job. And it's a privilege and a pleasure.<P>Morris' spanking new $6.3 million company headquarters in Brooklyn is still under construction. But the offices have been open for a month and half, and at least one of the studios will be ready for June 11. There will be facilities for creating and presenting his own work, but the four-storey building will also function as school and dance community centre. Morris' comment about the whole milestone enterprise is an eloquently simple "Unbelievable!"<P>Our conversation is quick, low-key and rambling. Is he likely to be making dances till he drops? Essentially, yes. "I'll stop performing before I stop choreographing." Morris is the master of the practical quip. Beyond the new building, what are his current goals? "I don't have a big plan except everything that's planned for the next several years." Schedule permitting, he's likely to be teaching occasionally in the fall - open class, company class, maybe now and again a choreographic workshop. How does that function? "I give very direct, plain composition problems which people have to solve in a very short period of time. We look at it and say why things work or not. Or I'll give them a very simple pieces of music that everyone has to choreograph to - twenty minutes to make up a new dance. I don't know how to teach except by making it up on the day."<P>Morris likewise subscribes to no choreographic formula. "Doris Humphrey advised people to make up the ending of a dance first, so that you'd know where you're headed. Why bother? More and more I tend to work on a dance from beginning to end. What I finish one day decides what I'll do the next. I try to build in something that will automatically surprise me, but I don't know in what way. Like, I can't use any diagonals in this or that dance. It's setting up a system of the unpredictable."<P>There is no signature Morris style, Rather, his sensibility is wide-ranging and generous. "I like a lot of different stuff. Maybe that's a weakness. I'm versatile. It's great and horrible." When it comes to choosing repertory, he is as careful as you'd expect. He is also protective of his dances. "That's why I don't set many dances on other companies. I wanna know how it's gonna be." Although inundated with requests for new work, Morris usually declines. An exception was a little group in Ohio. "I like 'em so much. They knew I was a folk dancer [in younger days]. We had a big party and they asked, would I consider making up a dance for them? And they had the wherewithal to get a grant for it. It's the only dance I ever made up for a folk dance company."<P>San Francisco Ballet is another, sterling example of a troupe he trusts. They will be presenting two Morris pieces in London this August, the delightful Sandpaper Ballet and the new A Garden. This brace of dances could be regarded as a warm-up for the Morris Group's Umbrella 2001 programme, and the tour that follows the dates at Sadler's Wells. It's a big tour, the biggest his company has had in the UK to date - eight cities, from Edinburgh to Woking. The dances he'll bring are rich and varied in tone and content. All of it will be accompanied by live music - not full orchestras, but a handful of musicians.<P>While Morris is looking forward to the tour - "It'll be fun" - there is one thing he will not do in advance. "Honey, trying to get me to describe a dance is just wasting your breath. I'll talk about my work, but I won't describe a dance. People can watch 'em. I don't have to spoon-feed." This isn't arrogance. He simply doesn't want his work to be pre-digested, a done-deal even before the curtain goes up. Where is the mystery, the sense of adventure, in that? With Mark Morris, discovery - and re-discovery - is a part of what makes the work of this natural-born genius such fun for us.<P><BR>MARK MORRIS DANCE GROUP UK TOUR 2001<P>TUE 23 - WED 24 OCT NEW VICTORIA THEATRE, WOKING<BR>FRI 26 - SAT 27 OCT THEATRE ROYAL, NEWCASTLE<BR>MON 29 - TUE 30 OCT EDINBURGH FESTIVAL THEATRE<BR>FRI 2 - SAT 3 NOV SNAPE MALTINGS CONCERT HALL, ALDEBURGH<BR>TUE 6 - WED 7 NOV MILTON KEYNES THEATRE<BR>FRI 9 - SAT 10 NOV BIRMINGHAM REP<BR>MON 12 - TUE 13 NOV LOWRY CENTRE, MANCHESTER<BR>FRI 16 - SAT 17 NOV WYCOMBE SWAN, HIGH WYCOMBE<P><P>------------------<BR>This interview was posted by Stuart Sweeney on behalf of Donald Hutera.<P>Donald Hutera writes regularly on dance and arts for The Times, Evening Standard, Time Out, Dance Europe, Dance Magazine (US) and Dance Now. He is co-author, with Allen Robertson, of The Dance Handbook.<P>This interview first appeared in either the Spring or Autumn 2001 editions of Dance Umbrella News. <BR> <BR>Join Dance Umbrella's mailing list to receive future editions of Dance Umbrella News. <BR>Call: 020 8741 5881 <BR>Email: mail@danceumbrella.co.uk <BR>Web: <A HREF="http://www.danceumbrella.co.uk" TARGET=_blank>www.danceumbrella.co.uk</A>

_________________This interview was posted by Stuart Sweeney on behalf of Donald Hutera and first appeared in Dance Umbrella News.

Donald Hutera writes regularly on dance and arts for The Times, Evening Standard, Time Out, Dance Europe, Dance Magazine (US) and Dance Now. He is co-author, with Allen Robertson, of The Dance Handbook.

Judith Mackrell for the Guardian, reports:<P> <P><B>Judith Mackrell<BR>Wednesday October 17, 2001<BR>The Guardian</B> <P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Britain's love affair with Mark Morris has matured from smitten adoration to loyal appreciation, as regular visits from his company have given us wider and deeper views of his talent. But it is still pretty rare for British fans to be treated to the premiere of a new work and the highlight of last night's programme at the Wells was its unveiling of Morris's latest work, V. The title is partly a reference to the work's accompanying score, Schumann's Quintet in E flat for piano and strings. But it is also the formation from which the dancers first launch themselves, breaking out from a silhouetted V shape into choreography whose rapt, tender romanticism turns out to be angled with startlingly hard edges.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,3604,575710,00.html" TARGET=_blank><B> more...</B></A><P><BR>

<B>All in a spirit of joy</B><P>Mark Morris Dance Group: Mixed Programme<BR>by Luke Jennings<BR>The Evening Standard<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>A Morris world premiere is a major event, and last night the Seattle-born choreographer unveiled V, his new work to Robert Schumann's Quintet in E flat for Piano and Strings. <P>The quintet is one of Schumann' s most romantic compositions, and from the opening moment, when the allegro brillante bursts into life and Morris's company are revealed in an expectant diagonal, the mood is one of Apollonian joy. Michael Chybowski's lighting suggests an azure-skied Parnassus, while Morris' s blue-clad dancers seem to leap through colliding motes of sunshine. This, the five instruments simultaneously proclaim, is the morning of the world.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><A HREF="http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/hottx/theatre/dance_review.html?in_review_id=463762&in_review_text_id=419139" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A>

Ismene Brown in The Telegraph<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>I HAD a bad night's sleep after watching Mark Morris's latest dance, and I do not think it is coincidence. Dance is far superior to verbal or musical language, or even visual art, in drawing you away from plain reality and into your subconscious. But it's a rare choreographer who goes further - who can awaken the fevers of your own thoughts and then stun you with his own definitive images.<BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=005760794236107&rtmo=wK5lAnfb&atmo=rrrrrrrq&pg=/et/01/10/18/btang18.html" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A><P>And another from Debra Craine in the Times<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>A world premiere from the Mark Morris company is a real treat for London <BR> <BR>Mark Morris, the American choreographer extraordinaire, has brought his company to Britain for a month of touring which began at Sadler’s Wells on Tuesday night, part of the Dance Umbrella festival. London adores Mark Morris — his appearances light up our dance calendar like neon on Times Square — and he has repaid the compliment on this visit by giving us a world premiere. Not any old world premiere, mind you, but a masterwork <BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><A HREF="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,62-2001361867,00.html" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A><P>And Nadine Meisner in The Independent<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>As a choreographer Mark Morris is some sort of genius, as a performer he is a star and as a showcase his company is one of America's most viable dance exports. If you didn't already know this, then the programme at Sadler's Wells will drive it home in the most painless, delicious way possible<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre/dance/reviews/story.jsp?story=100023" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A><P><BR>And Clement Crisp in The Financial Times<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR> It is fascinating. You watch Mark Morris's dances and you see the music. There have been, in all conscience, other choreographers as musically apt, witty, subtle. Not one, in my experience, offers Morris's combination of seeming innocent exposition of a score - there are subliminal links with the "music realisations" of pioneering American free-dance in the 1920s - with such receptiveness to the music's inner life <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/article.html?id=011018001923&query=mark+morris" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A><P><p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited October 18, 2001).]

<B>Mark Morris Dance Group - A few quick thoughts and ticket availability</B><P>As you see from the extensive comments of the London critics, Mark Morris has another big hit in London. This programme at Sadler's Wells of works from the past 8 years is a superb evening of dance. By turns we see drama, humour, aching love and throughout beautiful and imaginative dance shapes and patterns. All accompanied by strongly rhythmic playing from small groups of excellent musicians.<P>I came out of the theatre on cloud nine. It was one of those evenings when the art form leaps off the stage and makes you realise again just how powerful dance can be.<P>Despite the fact that a chunk of the stalls seats have been taken out to make way for an extra 300 proms standing places, tickets are now very scarce:<P>Thursday - proms standing only at £5<BR>Friday - proms plus some singles<BR>Saturday mat. - more availability, but going fast<BR>Saturday eve. - proms plus aome singles<P>If you want to see one of the best dance evenings of the year in London, you need to move fast. Ring the box office on 020 7863 8000 for tickets.<P><B>Later</B>: I originally posted some details of the Mark Morris Dance Group UK tour here. Further down you will see the updated details from David Pratt of the Dance Umbrella team.<P><p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited October 18, 2001).]

The chat-room with Mark Morris on londondance.com was a success. Here are two snippets: <P>Q. How do you classify your work ? critics sometimes seem to have problems labelling it; do labels matter? <BR>A. I classify my work as very good. <BR>I call it 'dancing'. Labels do not matter.<P>Q. Your work for San Francisco Ballet was very well received here this Summer. Joanna Berman looked particularly lovely in 'A Garden'. Do you enjoy working with SFB and Joanna?<BR>A. I have choreographed four or five pieces for San Francisco Ballet. Here's why: they are versatile, intelligent, adult, friendly and they maintain my works beautifully... Joanna is a genius (did you see her Odette Odile?). In fact, I just finished making up a little solo for her to celebrate her retirement from the stage.<P><BR>Here is the full transcript:<BR> <A HREF="http://www.londondance.com/Content.asp?Level=4&SubSection=567" TARGET=_blank>http://www.londondance.com/Content.asp?Level=4&SubSection=567</A> <BR>

Article in The Sunday Times<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>When the Mark Morris Dance Group from New York first came to London in the early 1980s as part of the Dance Umbrella festival, the troupe was a smaller outfit than it is now, and Morris was a new name over here. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2001/10/21/sticuldnc02002.html?" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A><P>And in The Observer<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><BR>Morris first, because these Americans need to know how much we value them. The new piece is called simply V: set to Schumann's quintet in E flat for piano and strings, the V stands for five instruments and for victory over adversity. It is also the formation in which the dancers start and finish and to which they constantly return. V is a numbers game, in which two teams, seven a side, are distinguished by bright blue or pale grey silken shirts and shorts. <BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.observer.co.uk/review/story/0,6903,577596,00.html" TARGET=_blank><B> mORE </B> </A><p>[This message has been edited by Joanne (edited October 21, 2001).]

"V" is a masterpiece. When I saw the preview in the SF Bay Area a few weeks ago, I was mesmerized by the complexity of the work and taken away by its lyrical flow. Morris challenged himself with so many different variables in this work, yet he solves each choreographic problem not only successfully with grace and beauty. Lucky London to have its premiere performance.

'V' is certainly a very strong work. The anmazing thing is that quite a lot of us in London thought that 'Grand Duo' was even more interesting.<P>All the works in the programme were of a high quality. Mark Morris does seem to be on a roll at the moment.<p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited October 21, 2001).]

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